ERode

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

Character

Skills

• Master of Seas ★★★★★★
• Element Resistance ★★★
• Combat Sense ★
• Iron Skin ★

Inventory

• Half-Broken, Nicked One-Handed Sword
• Rope

“Aye, shush,” Belo whispered, pulling the mewling child off of him. It had been hours of wandering through the dark tunnels, scaring off anything that dared approach, but the fatigue was felt now. A heavier, weightier fatigue, one that reminded him that he literally could not remember the last time he ate food or drank water.

It had been a merciful thing then, for the light in the tunnel to be finally reached and for him to be able to breathe air that didn’t smell of soil and stagnation. Tall trees, so far removed from the scraggly groves he recalled, blotted out the sky. The brush itself was thick too, enough to swallow him whole if he simply sat down. If there was so much vegetation, then that had to mean that there was a source of water somewhere, no? He swallowed his saliva, looking about slowly. But it was movement, not the sound of a gurgling stream, that caught his attention.

A strange creature.

Bold antlers curved out from its crown like tree branches, its form similar to the gazelles in the center of his homeland yet packed with even more flesh, even more muscles. There was something distinctly masculine about it, dark fur hanging from its neck like a beard. Could he kill it? He regretted the lose of his knife twice-fold. The sword he held would be too unwieldy to carve the creature with. But even a leg or two would suffice. His stomach grumbled again. The runt of a child continued to mewl. He gave it a couple leaves to chew on, hoping that it’d be distraction enough.

And for himself?

It was impossible to move silently. There was too much undergrowth, and only a fool would consider the ‘silent’ stalking of a human to be imperceptible to the senses of a beast. He could mask his footsteps, but what about his smell? The smell of blood, the smell of sweat, the smell of desperation?

So Belo instead dropped into a sprinter’s posture, his black eyes staring at his quarry as it padded through the forest. His muscles tautened. His breaths deepened. He waited for it to stop. To graze. To chew. To relax. To…

Go!

He sprang forth, clods of dirt kicking up behind him. His ears flattened back from the resistance of the wind, his lungs heaving as his heart rate skyrocketed. Already, his muscles were protesting, tearing from the exertion. But his body had never been lighter, and that surreal cocktail of chemicals and hormones hit his brain to give Belo a vicious high like no other! The creature looked up, turned to flee, but his sword was faster! He had flung it and it spun in a murderous arc, the nicked edge slicing into the creature’s hindleg. Ah, there it was! The pop of a tendon rupturing!

And though the creature could still run with only three legs, its balance was lost. It crashed into the earth, its magnificent size enough to snap the sword in two halves as it fell. But that just made the weapon more useful to Belo. He swept it up on approach and leapt upon the creature, driving the broken tip into its throat as he ducked to evade its swinging horns.

More violence soon followed. Blood loss was not enough to dissuade the desperation of a prey animal, but the result itself had been decided.

…

Once more, Belo was soaked in blood that wasn’t his own and, as he watched steam rise up from the scalding blood that he was splattered with, he let out a slow sigh. It was a good thing that he had no hair or fur. A clump of dirt was all that he needed to wipe off most of the blood, before he went to retrieve the kid once more, who was certainly bawling over the bitterness of the leaves.

Raw meat wouldn’t be the best, but considering the circumstances?

“Eat up,” Belo spoke, as he sliced a bloody strip of flesh off the creature’s side. There were probably parasites and shit, but maybe he’d get lucky and miss out on those. If only they had a day and plenty of sun. Could sun-dry the meat, turn it into jerky. The air was too humid though. It’d rot before then. “C’mon, chomp chomp. Boys don’t cry.”

Wait, was this child even a boy?

“And it’s tasty too. Yum yum.”

The meat wasn’t tasting of anything except for iron. Awful stuff, but the body demanded fuel.

"Ah, right. Can you even talk?"

The kid had to be conscious enough to eat, and the ones who were his kind looked to have some sense of language, so...

...well, what was even the point? Not like he understood the language.

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

From his back, the little goblin child began to mewl pitifully.

Iris Ascendis

Truly Otis energy.



Maybe with a good dollop of 'RISE AND GRIND' as well.

Iris Ascendis

_{@Nanaya@AThousandCurses}

Otis was, after all, Neutral Evil. He possessed all the qualities necessary to be awake at 6 AM in the morning, even without understanding when breakfast would be served at the cafeteria. Possessed by his own internal clock, his eyes opened without so much as fluttering as the clock struck six, and he rolled out off his bed in that same swift motion. Morning stretches followed soon after, vigorous movements that warmed up his muscles and shook awake his organs. He flung open the windows afterwards, allowing the cold morning air to flow in and uncorked his waterskin to take a swig of lemon water to finish things off. The water would occupy his stomach long enough to hold off hunger pangs until breakfast proper, and as he breathed deep, as he allowed the cold air to grant him that sense of ‘alacrity’, the Strigidae finally attended to the message that his Adapa notified him of.

There was only a single thing that was truly worth noting: Davil was a Wund.

So that was his peculiarity. So that informed his desire for unification. So that…did little to explain his incompetence, especially compared to the Leuvalt scion. Otis glanced over at the young man, snoring carelessly away in his bed, and narrowed his eyes. He was Neutral Evil, after all. The only thing that existed was his pursuit of pure knowledge, and he would take any measure to further that pursuit. In this case? He produced smelling salts from his pouch and placed the opened vial right up against his roommate’s expanding nostrils. Moments later, Davil would either be awake or be considered clinically comatose.

“A hero, stalwart and kind,” was Otis’s morning greeting to his bleary-eyed roommate. It sounded almost like sarcasm when the Strigidae said it. “Recall your oath, Davil. Your Ethos is mine for seven days. This is the first.”

And without hesitation, he thrust the winged boots towards Davil, before striding purposefully out of their dorm room, sparing only a single glance to indicate that he should follow. It didn’t matter to Otis whether or not they had a whole class on the Basics of Essence after all, nor did it matter to him that it held so foreboding a topic as ‘Survival’. He didn’t even care for the manifestation of that golden guardian in the first floor, nor of Rio’s defeat of three strangers. And if he couldn’t care enough to attend to that bit of curiosity, then Otis certainly didn’t care enough to even offer a nod towards his ally from yesterday, that bespectacled boy who tried to broker a meaningless trade.

Instead, he led Davil out to the courtyard instead, where Otis stated a simple instruction.

“Charge your Ethos into your boots to maximum capacity. Then try to release as much of it as you can in one second, for the purpose of moving forwards.” As he spoke, his Adapa emerged, the burning grimoire already set to record. His right hand touched a spot between his eyes as well, a self-suggestion spell that enhanced his arcane ability to discern individual essence. “Remember, Davil. Forward, not upward.”

First, it would be uncovering the Prime Essence associated with the Linearic Linear, as well as its actual output. With the remaining time after, he could examine topics such as whether or not the expenditure of the Ethos charge could be paused, or whether it was a multi-directional or unidirectional boost in movement. And then? Once that charge was expired, he could experiment too, to see if it was a matter of reaching rebound or a matter of specific limitations on individual objects.

Plenty to do, certainly, but they had a whole hour before breakfast.

“Begin, please.”

Expedition to Isekai

---

//Night 1 | Location: Nameless Forest - Lakeside
_{@AThousandCurses@baraquiel@Nakushita@Yankee@Vertigo}
Tensions rose undoubtedly as Ayana responded. Akito’s smirk was implacable in the face of her words though, the brown-haired delinquent clearly unphased by her ramblings. Perhaps it would have been different if the two of them were alone, but in a group like this? No fucking shot.

“Right, right,” he drawled, “So what you’re saying is that you wanna be the leader here, yeah? Replace ol’ Masato over there? Cause I’m not hearing anything that proves the whole ass truth thing you’re talking ‘bout here, ya fucking weirdo.”

“Shut up, traitor.” Kogen snarled, from his position in the outskirts of the group huddle. “You know nothing of the power we bear.”

That just drove a laugh out from Akito. “Oh shit, the crazies are banding together! Feels good to have your del-”

Whatever he planned on saying next was cut short. For all the small successes that Kogen had gained, he still remembered the humiliation as well, the betrayals both long past and very recent. It was all the excuse that he needed to rush Akito, demonic armor surging out from within his core as he grabbed the youth by throat and slammed him into the ground.

Akito gurgled, hands clawing ineffectually against the superhuman grip that kept him pinned. The demonic visage before him, before all of them, showed no signs of stopping though. It was something that had been a long time coming.

“H-hey!” Tsubaki tried to intercede anyways, standing up in a hurry. “Kogen, calm down! Those are just words!”

"Kogen!" Daisuke strode up as well, though he kept his distance. "Akito was out of line, but this is too much. We can't have fights like this happen!" Especially not when this was a crystallization of the 'tyranny' that was possible between those who were straight up superhuman and those who weren't.

A couple of the others tried to reason as well, but at the same time, Asahi’s own tempers flared, pink threads weaving out from his fingertips. Despite his bravery, his confidence, he knew too that his own reserves hadn’t filled up. Ayana was, after all, perhaps the one Awakened other than Masato who was the ‘healthiest’ of them all. She had only been smothered by one of the hulk-phants, and had only been knocked out by Shun. She had expended the least energy out of them all, and thus had the most to give. Could he handle her?

Whatever the situation was, Rin decided that she didn’t care for any of it. As far as she was concerned, the meeting was over and they were all just messing around now. Without another glance, she turned, returning to the small lumberyard and workshop, only sparing a quick comment towards Kumi, as if recognizing that a fellow ‘artisan’ ought to also avoid getting caught up in this.

Of course, Asahi’s own threats wouldn’t just be left unanswered, as Ayana’s sister-in-law sprang up between the two of them. As far as rumors and hearsay had proliferated, the students had only understood Asahi’s powers as some sort of healing magic, but what was this? “Hold up, what do you even mean by that? Asahi, what the hell do those things even do?” Tensions rose further, the fashionista’s eyes set into a distrustful glare. “What are you trying to do here?”

Sasuke stepped up with a calming gesture, hands raised placatingly. “Calm down. Asahi’s jus-”

“She’s not talking to you, Sasuke.” Ayano bounced up now, Fujita a reluctant ally to his girlfriend’s eagerness to square up alongside her friends. “Dunno what that guy’s up about, but Ayana was helping m…y boyfriend build the shelter with a buncha the other girls. Until, you know, Shun over there knocked her out for no reason? Sheesh, wonder why Asahi doesn’t think she was contributing!”

“Doesn’t excuse the fact that she’s actin’ crazy,” Mayumi responded, a sardonic half-smile on her face. “You really gonna think she’s alright after hearing that?”

And as everything looked like it would bubble over, two separate conflicts flaring up, the Awakened and the unawakened both butting heads over something that had nothing to do at all about their future plans, Hana stepped behind Masato.

Her words, as neutral as ever, nevertheless held a peculiar edge.

“This won’t be solved with words alone.”

Iris Ascendis

For planning purposes, Nanaya, when did you plan to have the catfight happen? Surely not during class?

Children of the Otherworld - An Isekai Story

Thar be any hope for this weekend?

Kurai Majokko

_{@CamiCat@FroggRFlowR}

They raced through the night, Suna laughing all through out. Laughing through the exhaustion and pain, through the way her ribs wheezed with every inhale and exhale, through the way each step rattled the microfractures in her bones.

Perhaps it was just a few blocks. Perhaps they passed by police boxes. Perhaps they were out running for far too long, or perhaps they ended up getting into places that they really shouldn’t have been. Regardless, by the end of it, the blue-eyed criminal collapsed beside a vending machine, her breaths coming in and out heavily as she wiped the sweat off her brow. They were in a side street behind a love hotel, having weaved their way in and out of the crisscrossing grids of Hibusa City before finally reaching this point. Close by were the saccharine voices of young men and women alike, host clubs catering to all orientations, while alcohol, fried foods, and cigarette smoke mingled into an aroma that was mature to the point of being just slightly nauseating.

Not a place for shrine maidens and good little kids to be, but what hero was repulsed by humanity’s cravings?

“Phew,” Suna spoke, popping back up to her feet. She unzipped her jacket, fanning out the sweat-soaked undershirt beneath. A coin purse somehow found its way in her other hand, though she had made no moves before to retrieve anything from her pockets, and she shook it, as if to confirm there were any coins left in it. “Didn’t think you’d both follow me this far! Whatcha want, Kaeru, Teddy Girl? I’d recommend the red bean soup myself.”

A tilting of her head, a half-smile cresting her features. The love hotels walls were sound-proof, of course, but all the soundproofing didn't mean too much if one of the occupants opened a window.

"Know a place 'round here with pretty cheap food too, if you're hungry instead."

Iris Ascendis

I'll ask you to look very carefully at Otis's appearance. ;3

Iris Ascendis

<Snipped quote by ERode>

@Nanaya